Thirteen Colonies in Search of a Nation

On November 15, 1777, as the Second Continental Congress huddled in York, Pennsylvania, having fled the British occupation of Philadelphia, they voted to approve a document that would become America's first constitution. The Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union represented an extraordinary gamble: Could thirteen fractious colonies, each jealously guarding their sovereignty, create a government strong enough to win a war yet weak enough to preserve their cherished independence?

The answer, as events would prove, was both yes and no. The Articles would guide America through the remainder of the Revolutionary War and the crucial early years of independence, yet their very weaknesses would ultimately necessitate their replacement. To understand this paradox, this document that was simultaneously essential and inadequate, we must first appreciate just how unprecedented and improbable the American union truly was.

A Continent of Strangers

The thirteen colonies that banded together to resist British authority in the 1770s had not been created as a unified whole but rather emerged piecemeal over a century and a half, each established "one at a time and for different reasons." Despite their common inheritance of the English language and English legal traditions, their differences would have seemed far more important than their similarities to anyone observing them in the mid-18th century.

Consider the profound contrasts: Massachusetts Bay had been founded by Puritan religious dissidents seeking to create a "city upon a hill" governed by strict Calvinist principles. Rhode Island emerged as a refuge for those expelled from Massachusetts for religious nonconformity, establishing unprecedented separation between church and state. Pennsylvania was William Penn's "holy experiment" in Quaker governance and religious toleration. Virginia and the Carolinas developed plantation economies dependent on enslaved labor and governed by wealthy planter aristocracies. New York retained elements of its Dutch commercial heritage. Georgia began as a philanthropic project for debtors and "the worthy poor."

These weren't mere cultural differences but fundamental variations in economy, social structure, religious practice, and political organization. As Thomas Pownall, who had served as governor of Massachusetts Bay colony from 1757 to 1760, observed in 1764, the colonies would always remain "disconnected and independent of each other" because of "the different manner in which they are settled, the different modes under which they live, the different forms of charters, grants, and frames of government which they possess, the various principles of repulsion, the different interest which they actuate, the religious interests by which they are actuated, the rivalry and jealousies which arise from hence, and the impracticability, if not the impossibility, of reconciling and accommodating these incompatible ideas and claims."

Until the middle of the 18th century, each colony interacted primarily one-on-one with the government in London rather than with sister colonies. They competed for royal favor, disputed boundary lines, maintained separate currencies and trade policies, and viewed each other more as rivals than as potential partners.

The First Tentative Steps Toward Unity

The first attempt at common action had been the Albany Congress of 1754, convened at the beginning of the French and Indian War. Only seven colonies participated, and while this Congress adopted Benjamin Franklin's Albany Plan of Union, not a single colony ratified it. The plan's rejection demonstrated both the practical difficulties of inter-colonial cooperation and the deep-seated colonial resistance to any authority that might compromise their individual autonomy.

The opposition to the Stamp Act of 1765 led to the Stamp Act Congress in October 1765, which brought together delegates representing 9 of the 13 colonies. Yet that Congress met for less than three weeks before disbanding, after which there was no common institution uniting the colonies until crisis forced them together again.

It wasn't until September and October 1774 that the First Continental Congress assembled in Philadelphia, bringing together delegates from twelve colonies (Georgia abstained) to coordinate response to the Coercive Acts. Even then, Joseph Galloway presented a plan of union that resembled the Albany Plan, but it was narrowly rejected by delegates who feared creating institutions that might constrain their colonies' independence.

War Breeds Urgency: The Push for Confederation

The outbreak of fighting at Lexington and Concord in April 1775 transformed theoretical discussions about colonial unity into practical necessities of wartime coordination. When the Second Continental Congress convened in May 1775, it found itself gradually assuming governmental functions, raising an army, appointing commanders, conducting diplomacy, issuing currency, without any formal constitutional authority to do so.

Already in 1775, visionaries like Benjamin Franklin and Silas Deane began drawing up plans for a permanent union. Thomas Paine, in his explosive January 1776 pamphlet Common Sense, offered his ideas for a permanent continental form of government that would replace British authority with American self-rule.

When Richard Henry Lee rose in Congress on June 7, 1776, to propose independence, he also proposed "that a plan of confederation be prepared and transmitted to the respective Colonies for their consideration and approbation." Congress responded by appointing a committee of thirteen, one representative from each colony, to work on articles of confederation.

John Dickinson's Draft: The Difficult Birth of Union

John Dickinson of Pennsylvania played the major role on this committee, and the initial draft submitted to Congress on July 12, 1776, just eight days after the Declaration of Independence, was written in his own handwriting. The document consisted of twenty articles outlining a governmental structure that would balance state sovereignty with national coordination.

Yet even as the committee worked, fundamental disagreements emerged that would plague the Articles throughout their existence. Should representation in Congress be based on population or on equal votes for each state? Should contributions to the national treasury be proportional to population or to land values? Should Congress have power to regulate western territories or would that remain with individual states? The questions revealed not mere technical disputes about governmental mechanics but profound conflicts about the nature of the union being created.

The debates consumed sixteen months during which Congress had "a great many other matters to deal with", conducting a desperate war against the world's most powerful military, managing diplomacy with potential European allies, attempting to establish credit and currency, coordinating military campaigns across a thousand-mile coastline. The final version, reduced to thirteen articles from the original twenty, was finally adopted on November 15, 1777.

The Structure of Confederation: Sovereignty Jealously Guarded

The document that emerged from these lengthy deliberations reflected colonial determination to preserve maximum autonomy while creating minimum necessary coordination. Article I simply stated that "The style of this confederacy shall be 'The United States of America'", a name that emphasized the plural nature of the union.

Article II made explicit what would become the defining characteristic of the

Confederation: "Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right which is not by this confederation expressly delegated to the United States in Congress assembled." This was not federalism but rather a league of friendship among sovereign states that remained fundamentally independent.

Article III came closest to articulating the union's purpose: "The said states hereby severally enter into a firm league of friendship with each other, for their common defense, the security of their liberties, and their mutual and general welfare, binding themselves to assist each other against all force offered to, or attacks made upon them, or any of them, on account of religion, sovereignty, trade, or any other pretense whatever."

Notably, throughout the Articles, the government being formed acted upon the states as states, not on individual citizens within those states. While Article IV implicitly recognized common national citizenship by guaranteeing that "the free inhabitants of each of these states, paupers, vagabonds, and fugitives from justice excepted, shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of free citizens in the several states," the primary relationship remained between Congress and state governments rather than between Congress and individual Americans.

Congressional Structure: Equality Without Population

Under the Articles, each state was represented in Congress by between two and seven delegates, but regardless of delegation size, each state cast only one vote. If a single delegate was present, the state could not vote at all, ensuring that important decisions required consultation among multiple representatives.

The terms were for a year at a time, though delegates could be reappointed. However, to prevent entrenchment of a political class, no delegate could serve for more than three years out of any six-year period. Significantly, delegates were chosen by state legislatures rather than by direct popular vote, reinforcing that they represented sovereign states rather than a unified national populace.

Congress was to meet on the first Monday in November each year, and no adjournment could exceed six months, provisions designed to ensure continuous governmental presence. For important matters such as declaring war, the assent of nine states was required, creating a supermajority requirement that protected minority interests but also made decisive action difficult.

Most fatefully, any amendment to the Articles required unanimous approval from all thirteen states. This provision, intended to protect state sovereignty, would prove to be a

fatal flaw that prevented even modest reforms when the system's inadequacies became apparent.

The Western Lands Crisis: Maryland's Heroic Obstinacy

Congress sent the approved Articles to the states for ratification in November 1777, optimistically setting March 10, 1778, as the deadline for completion. Virginia became the first state to ratify on December 16, 1777, but the process immediately encountered obstacles that would delay final ratification for more than three years.

The crisis centered on the vast western territories that several "landed" states claimed by virtue of their colonial charters. Virginia's 1609 charter, interpreted broadly, could encompass not only present-day Kentucky but also most of the land north of the Ohio River extending to the Mississippi. Massachusetts, Connecticut, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia similarly claimed western territories, while New York asserted claims based on its overlordship of the Iroquois nations.

Six "landless" states, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland, had no such claims and viewed with alarm the prospect of their neighbors controlling vast western empires. The landless states demanded that borders be set on the landed states and that western territories be opened to all Americans to settle under congressional jurisdiction.

By mid-1778, ten states had ratified, but three landless states, New Jersey, Delaware, and Maryland, refused. By February 1779, New Jersey and Delaware had reluctantly assented, but Maryland continued its heroic obstinacy, insisting that western lands must be ceded to Congress before ratification.

Maryland's position rested on principled concerns about preserving political equality among states and preventing the emergence of western land monopolies. Yet the state's stance was also influenced by Maryland land speculators who had purchased claims to western territories and hoped to fare better with Congress than with Virginia in having their prewar claims recognized.

The British Threat: Foreign Diplomacy Forces Domestic Resolution

During this impasse, international events added urgency to the ratification crisis. In 1780, as British forces began conducting raids on Maryland communities in the Chesapeake Bay, the state government desperately sought French naval assistance. Anne-César de La Luzerne, the French minister to the United States, responded with a message that was simultaneously reassuring and pointed: French Admiral Destouches would provide what assistance he could, but Luzerne also "sharply pressed" Maryland to ratify the Articles, suggesting that French support might depend on American unity.

Luzerne understood what Maryland's politicians were learning through bitter experience: without a legitimate national government recognized by all states, the fledgling nation remained weak, divided, and vulnerable to foreign intervention and manipulation. Other frustrated state governments had begun passing resolutions endorsing formation of a national government without Maryland, but cooler heads like Congressman Thomas Burke of North Carolina persuaded them that unanimous approval was essential for creating a government with genuine legitimacy.

Virginia's Fateful Decision: Land for Union

To break the impasse, Congress reversed its earlier position and recommended that the landed states voluntarily relinquish generous portions of their western territories. Virginia, with the most extensive claims, held the key to unlocking the crisis.

Prompted by Thomas Jefferson, who combined visionary thinking about republican expansion with practical understanding of political necessity, Virginia made a momentous decision. On January 2, 1781, the Virginia legislature offered to cede to the Confederation all its claims to lands north of the Ohio River. Equally important were Virginia's stipulations: that speculators' private land claims be canceled and that new states be created from these territories and admitted to the Union "on terms of equality with the original thirteen."

This was a revolutionary proposal that would shape American development for generations. Rather than allowing western territories to remain as colonial dependencies or be absorbed into existing states as subordinate regions, Virginia proposed that they become new sovereign states with the same rights and status as the original thirteen. The principle of equality among states, regardless of when they joined the Union, became a defining feature of American federalism.

Virginia's action persuaded Maryland to ratify. On February 2, 1781, the Maryland General Assembly in Annapolis finally voted for ratification. On March 1, 1781, Maryland's delegates signed the engrossed Articles, and Congress proclaimed the formal creation of "a perpetual union."

The Flawed Achievement: A Constitution for Wartime

The government created by the Articles of Confederation was, by general agreement, too weak for the nation's long-term needs. Congress could request funds from states but could not compel payment through taxation. It could conduct foreign policy but lacked power to enforce treaty obligations on states. It could declare war but could not draft soldiers or requisition supplies directly. The system had no independent executive branch, no national judiciary, and no mechanism for resolving disputes between states beyond voluntary arbitration.

Moreover, the requirement of unanimous consent for amendments meant that the Articles could not be reformed even when their inadequacies became glaringly obvious. Attempts to grant Congress power to levy modest import duties failed because individual states withheld approval. Efforts to strengthen national authority foundered on the rock of state sovereignty jealously guarded.

Yet for all their manifest flaws, the Articles represented a noteworthy achievement that should not be dismissed simply because they were eventually replaced. As Professor Donald S. Lutz of the University of Houston observed in 1990, "The general impression is usually given that the Articles were wholly replaced by the 1787 Constitution. It would be more accurate to say that the 1787 document was generally wrapped around an amended Articles of Confederation. Depending upon how one counts words and provisions, from one-half to two-thirds of what is in the Articles showed up in the Federalist Constitution of 1787."

James Madison himself acknowledged this continuity in Federalist No. 40, published in January 1788: "The truth is, that the great principles of the Constitution proposed by the convention may be considered less as absolutely new, than as the expansion of principles which are found in the Articles of Confederation."

The Achievements of the Confederation Period

The greatest accomplishments under the Articles came in establishing frameworks for western territorial development that would guide American expansion for generations. The Land Ordinance of 1785 created systematic procedures for surveying and selling western lands, establishing the rectangular survey system that would organize settlement across the continent. The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 set guidelines for territorial government and eventual statehood that embodied principles of equality, republican governance, and (at least theoretically) opposition to slavery expansion.

These ordinances demonstrated that even a weak national government could achieve significant results when addressing issues where state interests aligned sufficiently to permit consensus. They also vindicated Virginia's vision of western territories as incubators for new states rather than as colonial possessions.

The Confederation Congress successfully concluded the Revolutionary War and negotiated the Treaty of Paris of 1783, which secured American independence and established boundaries extending to the Mississippi River. These diplomatic achievements occurred despite the government's manifest weaknesses, suggesting that the Articles provided sufficient authority for core national functions even as they proved inadequate for more extensive governance.

The Road to Philadelphia: Learning from Failure

By the mid-1780s, the inadequacies of the Confederation had become undeniable. States issued competing currencies, erected trade barriers against each other, and failed to honor treaty obligations. Congress could not pay its debts to foreign creditors or domestic veterans. The inability to regulate interstate commerce created economic chaos. Shays' Rebellion in Massachusetts demonstrated that state governments might be overwhelmed by internal unrest without national assistance.

Alexander Hamilton, who had served as Washington's aide and witnessed firsthand the frustrations of trying to conduct war with an ineffectual government, became convinced that only fundamental reform could save the American experiment. He led efforts culminating in the Annapolis Convention of 1786, which petitioned Congress to call a constitutional convention in Philadelphia to remedy the long-term crisis.

The Constitutional Convention that met in Philadelphia in 1787 produced a document that was both a repudiation and an evolution of the Articles. It created a genuinely national government with power to tax, regulate commerce, and act directly on individual citizens. Yet it also preserved federalism, state sovereignty in reserved matters, and many specific provisions drawn directly from the Articles.

The Essential Foundation

Without the experience of the Articles of Confederation, the Constitution as we know it could not have come into existence. The Articles taught Americans what kind of government they did not want, one so weak it could neither govern effectively nor command respect from foreign powers. But they also established principles and precedents that the Constitution preserved and expanded: the commitment to republican government, the idea of written constitutions limiting governmental power, the vision of western expansion through addition of new states rather than colonial dependencies, and the understanding that union required balancing state and national authority.

The Articles of Confederation were not a failure but rather an essential step in the remarkable experiment of creating representative government over an extended territory. They reflected the colonists' very real fears of centralized power while demonstrating that complete decentralization was equally dangerous. They protected state sovereignty while creating mechanisms for national action. They were imperfect, transitional, and ultimately inadequate, yet they were also necessary, instructive, and in their own way, visionary.

As we approach the 250th anniversary of their adoption, the Articles deserve recognition not as a failed constitution but as the first constitution, the document that gave institutional form to American independence, guided the nation through perilous early years, and provided the foundation upon which a more perfect union could be built.

Citations and Sources

Primary Documents:

• National Archives. "Articles of Confederation (1777)." https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/articles-of-confederation

• \University of Wisconsin, Center for the Study of the American Constitution.

"Ratification of the Articles of Confederation." https://archive.csac.history.wisc.edu/706.htm

Historical Analysis:

• U.S. Department of State, Office of the Historian. "Milestones: 1776-1783: Articles of

Confederation, 1777-1781." https://history.state.gov/milestones/1776-1783/articles

• HISTORY. "The Articles of Confederation are ratified after nearly four years | March 1, 1781." https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/march-1/maryland-finally-ratifiesarticles-of-confederation

• HISTORY. "Articles of Confederation - Weaknesses, Definition, Date." https://www.history.com/topics/early-us/articles-of-confederation

Academic Sources:

• Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History. "The Articles of Confederation, 1777." https://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-resources/spotlight-primary-source/articlesconfederation-1777

• EBSCO Research Starters. "Ratification of the Articles of Confederation." https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/history/ratification-articles-confederation

• The Constitutional Walking Tour of Philadelphia. "The Articles of Confederation are Ratified by Final State - This Day in History - February 2, 1781." https://www.theconstitutional.com/blog/2022/02/01/articles-confederation-are-ratifiedfinal-state-day-history-february-2-1781

Reference Sources:

• Wikipedia. "Articles of Confederation." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Articles_of_Confederation

Scholarly Citations:

• Lutz, Donald S. "The Articles of Confederation as the Background to the Federal Republic." Publius: The Journal of Federalism, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Winter 1990), pp. 55-70.